


Unravel This Thread

by Senket



Series: The Clothes Make The Man [6]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Case Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-04-01
Updated: 2011-04-01
Packaged: 2017-11-15 16:34:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/529318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Senket/pseuds/Senket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John's jumper turns up in an unlikely place.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unravel This Thread

Sex with Sherlock was not completely unpredictable.

During cases it was always fast and rough, sometimes spontaneous, typically sudden and occasionally in some very strange places. It was usually good, regardless of the total lack of foreplay; John generally deemed that sort of unfortunate sometimes. He was a _big_ fan of foreplay, giving more than receiving (which was lucky, considering) but there was nothing quite like Sherlock Holmes turning around suddenly and slamming you against a wall, hands everywhere, absolutely intent on having his way with you _then and there_.

The best was immediately after cases, adrenaline pumping through both of them and all the time they wanted, fast and messy and hard at first, and then lazy, John all over Sherlock and the detective catching his breath desperately, working to make it last, _intense_ all the way through.

But during the lulls between, oh then. Sometimes sex was fantastic, Sherlock using John as a funnel for all of his overactive senses, focusing entirely on making him absolutely lose his mind. John enjoyed that- rather a lot. _Sometimes_ though... a bored Sherlock was irritating at the best of times, but sometimes John just wanted to _strangle_ him.

He already felt frustrated, eyes narrowing as he watched Sherlock. The detective’s gaze roved around the room, fingers tapping against the mattress. Fighting down niggling irritation, John ran his fingers down a white calf, lightly running his tongue over the other man’s Achilles’ tendon, sucking a kiss against the taunt skin. Sherlock sighed- not a pleased, low sigh, lids drooping while darkened eyes swept over John, but a groan of boredom, one that said ‘get on with it, then’ just as clearly as the actual words would have.

John dropped the leg without pause, standing up. “Where are you going?” Sherlock asked, suspicious and petulant, rising on his elbows.

“I’m going to have a wank in the shower,” John answered sharply from the closet, slinging a shirt and some pants over his arm, “and then I’m going to do the shopping so I can have more than toast tomorrow. After that I’ll see whether or not I still feel like hitting you.” He tromped into the bathroom and shut the door before he had to hear Sherlock’s reply, throwing his things about. His shoulder ached in protest, which he proceeded to viciously ignore.

John hardly felt better after his shower; rather than relieving the pressure, masturbating while Sherlock was just in the other room had made him angry at _both_ of them, and he was rather eager to just get some out for a while. And he was going to do it on his own terms.

He deliberately didn’t look at Sherlock when he went back into the bedroom, hanging up the pants he had taken and digging out the jeans Sherlock had saved so many months ago. He didn’t really have to check to know Sherlock was tracking his movements, cross-legged on the bed, probably bouncing slightly with excess energy, put-out and childish. “Have you seen my jumper?” he asked from inside the closet. He could clearly remember putting it back, and Sherlock usually left it alone in favour of the stripped one if he wasn’t wearing his bathrobe or the blue one John had bought him that once. 

No answer. Of course not, what had he been expecting?It wasn’t as though Sherlock actually kept _track_ of where he put anything. 

Stripped jumper it was, then, despite the fact that Sherlock hated for it to leave the flat (and hated for anyone to wear it against anything but bare flesh, but right now he just wanted to wear clothes that didn’t come from a family of rich busybodies obsessed with appearances. If it really bothered Cynthia Holmes that much you would think she’d do something about her sociopathic son’s terrible people skills.)

He had to hold his breath pulling it on, because if he paid too close attention he’d notice the way it smelled of their flat and their bed and their _sweat_ , and he didn’t want to touch Sherlock right now. He left in a huff.  
  
\-----  


  
John was gone barely a half-hour when Sherlock received a call from Lestrade.

_ “Sherlock, _ ” the inspector said, and he sounded unusually weary. That was a good sign, in Sherlock’s books, because that meant the mystery was particularly perplexing, at least for the official detective force, and might very well be actually interesting. He was put out at the moment, though, and that gave him every intention of making things as difficult for everyone involved as possible.   


“ _I’m at the Eye. You’ll want to come see this.”_

“I bet it’s boring,” Sherlock snapped back in reply, shoving around a pillow petulantly. “You always have trouble with the simplest cases. I’m frankly astounded you still have a job. I bet they’d already have thrown you out if they thought anyone else would work with me, because even your _bosses_ are desperate. The second I get Dimmock trained up you’re probably finished.” And so he couldn’t remember being purposely this rude before- well, not while lying, of course- but _John was such an idiot sometimes._

When he didn’t hear a response right away, Sherlock assumed Lestrade had hung up, resolving to do the case without Sherlock. He was surprised to hear the man’s voice instead of strident beeping a moment later.

_ “Sherlock, trust me. Come to Jubilee Gardens.”  _ He hadn’t been expecting the detective inspector to keep so cool, either. It had to be remarkably bad- that, or personal. They wouldn’t have sent Lestrade to a crime scene that involved someone he knew, would they? The police usually avoided that, didn’t they? Of course they would have. _“And bring John,”_ Lestrade added, resolute.

“I always bring John,” he said, wondering uncomfortably if his lover would refuse to accompany him out of stubborn self-righteousness. Perhaps it would be best to just wait until he returned. No, John had a strong sense of propriety; he might even welcome the distraction.

NEEDED AT THE EYE. ARE YOU COMING? SH

John didn’t answer. He was about to send a second text when he heard heavy footsteps, flinging the door open for John. The doctor raised an eyebrow when Sherlock took the shopping bags from him at the door, shrugging before disappearing into the bedroom to change. On the off-chance that Anderson actually _had_ a sense of smell, he didn’t want to- Well, anyway, an irate Cynthia Holmes was not something John wanted to be the cause of.

He came back out in some pressed black trousers, dark leather shoes, a crisp button-down in myrtle green, a black woollen dinner jacket and a skinny black tie. John looked contrite, unravelling and re-knotting his tie while he waited in the sitting room for Sherlock to reappear, grabbing the consulting detective’s coat off the door-hook when he heard him move in and tossing it to him without looking.

He ran down to hail a cab without waiting, straightening his shirt sleeves just as Sherlock slid in beside him.  
  
\-----  


The first thing Sherlock noticed when they reached the Eye was the crowd of grumbling people gathered about. He swanned right past them, smirking a little at glowering tourists as John passed beneath the police tape after him, marching straight for the crime scene. Sherlock stood next to an irritated-looking Donovan, smirking up at the immobile wheel. “You’ve closed it. You’ve closed the Eye! I expect this is losing the city a fortune!” Despite the (frankly rude) glee in his voice, Sally only replied with a thinning of her lips, glancing at Sherlock once and inclining her head towards the scene of the crime.

How unusual. The man flashed a smile and bounded towards the gathering of forensic experts. They parted before him without much fuss- _quite_ unusual. Lestrade and John stood at the front, looking down at something. Lestrade had his hand on John’s shoulder, the second man quite tense, hands in fists against his legs.

Curiosity flared high by all the frankly strange reactions all about him, Sherlock peered past the shorter men into the capsule. There was only one body, carefully positioned so that the head faced west. It was laid out as though in burial: not particularly unusual for ritualistic kills. Hair military-short, tan lines like John’s had been on their first meeting, army regulation trousers and boots. Fingernails were short, flecks of dirt and blood caught under them. A canvas duffle bag lay at the man’s feet, undisturbed, no doubt heavy, full, and regularly so from the strain around the zipper, the occasional skipped or missing tooth, and the heavy fraying along the edges of the thick shoulder strap. Probably all the man’s belongings, then, recently back from his own tour.

“You knew this man?” Sherlock asked, though he already had a (correct) theory of course, noting the extraneous tension in the doctor’s shoulders and hands, the stiff way he held his shoulder.

“He was in my regiment for a shift,” John answered tonelessly, hollow and low in pitch, “he’d sent me a message. We were to have coffee next week.” Sherlock glanced at him, but John wasn’t looking at the dead man’s face; his eyes were fixed on what he was wearing.

It was beige cabled jumper, frayed at the wrists, a line of tomato stain down the bottom, a patchwork of small holes up the underside of the right arm where it had been accidentally burnt with acid, smelling distinctly of old curry and expensive cologne. It was too big on the wiry soldier’s frame, too short for his long torso, and distinctly worn around the shoulders and elbows despite the spots of abrasion not matching the length of his limbs.

Sherlock closed his eyes and listened to John’s long, calming exhale.

Damn it.  


**Author's Note:**

> A/N: For no particular reason have this cracky bonus scene. _And if, at any point in the future, you wish I'd update something already, feel free to deliver to me a swift kick in the pants. I only bite if asked._
> 
> HELLO MYCROFT CAN I SEE THOSE SURVELLANCE TAPES YOU HAVE ON ME? SH  
> WHY YES, SHERLOCK, NOTHING OUT OF THE ORDINARY.  
> MORIARTY STOLE JOHN’S JUMPER AND PUT IT ON SOMEONE DEAD. SH  
> OH DEAR.


End file.
